Amos Miller, the Pennsylvania Amish farmer who has been trying to work through a U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) court action against his farm for four years now, is normally a soft-spoken philosophical man. But he gets nearly agitated when asked about recent USDA meat inspections at his farm. “They want everyone to obey the letter of the law, and then they don’t do it. I think it is high time they start walking the same line.”
“Walking the same line,” to Miller, means in this period of meat industry upheaval— more than 15,000 Covid-19 infections among workers at corporate meat plants around the country—abiding by safety, social distancing, and mask protocols. Here is what Miller said in a recent newsletter to the many hundreds of members of food clubs he supplies around the country:
“USDA investigator Paul Flanagan has been visiting the farm quite often the past several months with no disposable boots on, etc. So, one day we reminded him of that. He checked his vehicle and couldn’t find any. Then he left and now Miller’s Organic Farm is being fined $2,500.00 for not allowing them access to the facilities at that time. Yes! These are the things us farmers are dealing with out here.”
There’s more, and it’s even more disturbing: “Recently, since the pandemic, he was here, walked right into the office with no social distancing, no mask, no boots, etc. Is this the way of putting our farm at risk with what the large processing meat facilities are experiencing?”
Miller’s concern is understandable. No one knows which, if any, coronavirus-contaminated meat plants Flanagan visited prior to barging in on Miller’s farm, what viruses he was carrying on his boots or breathing onto the workers at Miller’s. The president has ordered meat plants to continue operating, despite protests from workers that they are being placed at undue risk of illness from Covid-19. The CDC has provided guidelines for improving safety for the workers, like spacing them apart, but there have been many complaints that they aren’t provided with essential protective equipment and clothing. Miller understandably wants not even the slightest connection to such mass sickness and contamination.
I contacted the USDA for comment last Thursday, and spoke with a public information official with the FSIS (Food Safety and Inspection Service). He promised to get back to me by the end of business last Friday. I figured he’d follow through, and tell me that as far as he knew, Flanagan and all USDA inspectors were following social distancing and mask protocols as recommended by the CDC.
The USDA official didn’t get back, even after I left a message reminding him of his commitment to provide comment. Why not? We can only speculate. One thought that crossed my mind is that possibly USDA inspectors are following the highly questionable safety model of their boss, the president, who refuses to wear a mask in his public appearances with other people, and taunts those who do as being “politically correct.” If he doesn’t, why should his subordinates in the federal bureaucracy, like meat inspectors?
While the USDA launched its current effort against Miller four years ago, it added legal heft a year ago when the U.S. Justice Department filed suit against the farm, accusing it of trying “to hide behind a private-membership-association structure in an effort to thwart federal laws.” Food clubs have become increasingly popular over the last decade as a way to provide ordinary people with healthy food produced by small farms, outside the corporate commodity system. Ostensibly, the USDA wanted Miller to send his farm’s cattle, chickens, and other animals for slaughter in USDA-inspected slaughterhouses; his farm’s animals have long been slaughtered on the farm, and butchered by Mennonite butchers with extensive experience. There’s never been a report of illness or bad meat from the farm.
The case has been overseen by a federal judge who, while he has generally acceded to USDA requests, has tried to steer Miller toward settling amicably with the agency. And in recent months, it seemed as if the case might be heading toward a peaceful agreement; Miller filed for a USDA custom exemption last year, whereby he can provide meat to members as owners of the animals, and the judge earlier this year allowed Miller to sell to members hundreds of pounds of frozen meat the agency had impounded.
But USDA pressure regulatory pressure in the form of aggressive inspections has continued unabated; early this year, the USDA inspector Paul Flanagan, who has been involved in the case since the beginning, began showing up every two weeks, according to Miller. When one of Miller’s workers requested that the inspector wear safety booties before coming into the main farm building, he responded that he didn’t have any along, and left. Shortly after, Miller was fined $2,500 for refusing an inspection.
Then, in early May, during the height of the pandemic, Flanagan showed up again, this time not only without booties, but without a face mask, and walked into the main building, surprising, and alarming, Miller’s workers (Miller wasn’t present). “They told me he walked right in. There was no social distancing or mask. My staff was not very comfortable.”
What makes the USDA affronts even more upsetting to Miller is that, like many small farm meat producers, he’s been inundated with new prospective members desperate for good food in the wake of the corporate system’s near-collapse over the last few months. He figures he’s turned away more than 100 individuals who wanted to sign up as members, and receive his farm’s meat and other foods, in part because of uncertainty about his own meat supply amid USDA harassment.
He is pushing his members to contact their U.S. reps to complain about the abuses against his farm. He also encourages them to push for passage of the PRIME Act, which would allow for intrastate sale of custom-slaughtered meat, but that has been stalled in Congress.
For now, Miller is discouraged. “We’ve lost so many farms in our area over the last 18 years because of all these regulations…Small farms are waiting to supply people during these shortages.” Miller understands that speaking out about USDA harassment and laxity on safety could inspire the agency to send in agents in hazmat suits and shut him down in reprisal, but he’s at the end of his rope. “We have to stand up.”
Compelled protocols motivated by fear naturally breads foolish inconsistent and contradictory behavior. All the regulators care about is their ego driven desire for absolute control and since they are not at all interested in walking the same line, they clearly don’t give a rats ass about food safety.
Here is another inconsistency that boggles the mind… “The autism crisis dwarfs COVID-19 ”… So why are the powers that be and mainstream media purposely disregarding that fact and choosing rather to focus on this irrational and outrageous germaphobe driven lunacy!!!
Indeed, “Fauci and Insel have committed some of the most consequential criminal conspiracies in history.” Covid-19 is just one of many…
https://childrenshealthdefense.org/news/one-in-every-16-irish-boys-has-autism-crisis-worse-than-covid-19-and-nobody-cares/?utm_source=salsa&eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=1cc64207-ec38-415f-a21d-c9e23acd7ea3
what wonderful irony … the Amish-volk of all people! chastising the rest of America “we have to stand up”. They were conspicuous by their absence in every single one of the major intrusions of state power in to the personal and religious realms, for the last century, ( at least). But now that it’s their ox being gored … all of a sudden the sky is falling!!
Next we’ll hear = “it’s a civil rights thing!”
the question of federal govt. power into personal domain was lost about 60 years ago… as the Amish stayed home and pulled the covers over their heads. As ??? put it “what would happen if they gave a war and no-one came? Then the war would come to you. And so it has come a’knockin’ on his door.
How droll that Herr Miller et al. have no compunction reaching out to us = “the English” = now, when the chips are down, … after pulling up the drawbridges to their little enclaves of quaint anachronism when it suited dem.
and I guess he covets the prayers of Christians with whom they refused to fellowship, eh ? all that while that they had such a good thing going …
Mr Miller is finding out he cannot have it both ways. He’d do well to harken to the lesson learned lately by Sam Girrod = settle with thine adversary in the way”
I figured you’d be full of compassion, Watson. No possibility, in your hatred, of concern for the real-food supply of many people very dependent on this source.
Wow you are a clown. Learn the definition of “chastising” if you’re gonna try to use a big boy’s word.
my definition of “chastise” goes all the way back to 1611 AD when the advisory Group to King James put together that version of the Bible.
Rather than coming off like a braying jackass you’d do better to read the Bible = and ALL of it = to get proper understanding of what goes on with ‘chastise-ment’. Compare with what Mr Gumpert reported Amos Miller having said
meanwhile >>> anything intelligent to contribute re REAL MILK ?
food in Ham-merica is super-abundant.
in practice ; THE problem with the dairy industry is : oversupply … in the 2 books of yours that I’ve read, I do not see you mentioning that issue.
from what you’ve told us, Mr Miller wants us all to sympathize with his predicament. If you’re in touch with him … ( whilst picking up your private stash of pork chops? ) … get him to address = why his little local spat with the Powers-that-Be ought to concern Americans in general, when one of the basic claims-to-fame of his cult, is : ‘separation from the world’… or so they pretend when it works well for enhancing the Amish Amos (c) brand name
Mr Miller is displaying the knack for which lawyers are in-famous : sucking and blowing at the same time … trading on his theological quirk-i-ness, all the while handling the filthy lucre of ‘the English”. remind him of Jesus’ advice > no man can serve 2 masters.
Of course!! he / his whole extensive consanguine crew can operate any way they want. That’s not my business. Apologetics of the Christian faith IS my calling. It galls me to see the Amish make merchandise of their theology
The Sickness in Our Food Supply
Michael Pollan
https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2020/06/11/covid-19-sickness-food-supply/
The centralization of food production and vulnerability to disease can be summed up in three words, “cheap food policies”. Indeed, government implemented policies that cater to the consumers desire for low cost food and unnatural so-called fixes that further exacerbate the problem of poor health.
Make sure Thomas Massie sees this one!!!
Regardless of policy ( good or bad or even misguided ) a President should lead and be dedicated to that policy. He should be the chief example of that policy. Donald Trump has pets a lot bankrupted his companies four times.
His fifth bankruptcy is our country. The current bankruptcy goes deep.
His fifth BK, is moral, ethical, economic, medical and Racially divisive. It is complete.
Everything he touched dies. So darn true.
I was very encouraged to see so many police chiefs and sheriffs join protesters and link arms with people in joint protest against the recent video taped police murder torture.
My daily prayer is for Trump to be arrested along with McConnell, Bar and others and tried for treason. It is clear. So damn clear.
Trump is performing for Russia. He wants to be an oligarch. All the power no responsibility and all the money. Human rights mean nothing to him. Humanity is a troublesome hurdle. He has no capacity for compassion.
Treason. This is a tragic time for America. Those that voted for him to get change sure got change. They also got Destruction and chaos.
As far as Amos is concerned, I visited his far. I thought it was very clean and well managed.
The inspector has a personal problem.
All of our CDFA inspectors would not dare inspect without complete PPE as a demonstration of respect for our operations and our people.
Treason.
Trump is trying to kill America.
We will outlast him. He will be his own final Tweet victim.
Mark, you have more or less described the political atmosphere in Washington for at least the last hundred years. A Machiavellian atmosphere in the Capital and in the United States overall that the American people are sick and tired of having to deal with. Hence, the election of Donald Trump in 2016… and likely his reelection in 2018, compliments of the Democratic party who keep shooting themselves in the foot due to their obsessed ill will and jealousy with the man.
you’re so trite, Mark McAffee : stick to what you know, milk. Your kneejerk opinion re politics is that of a red diaper baby stuck in the twilight zone of the 60s.
over a century of the US currency based on a false premise now coming to its IN-evitable demise > over half a century of insane policy as the American empire exported war around the world > successive Presidents pandering to race traitors …etc. etc. … but as far as you’re concerned = ALL that accumulated debt and moral hazard is the fault of one, Donald Trump. …..yeah, Right
as for your taunt = “racially divisive” … the last few days vindicated the worry white citizens had when they went out and bought their guns and LOTS of ammo, ahead of the ‘protests’. Regardless of whoever the Democratic Party puts up as its candidate / poverty pimp in November, aforesaid white folks will be voting for the man who demonstrated he has their interests at heart.
the anti-fa, are just doing what they – unapologetic communists – are trained to do. Ergo Trump is now seen as the classic strong man who rides in on a white horse, to stabilize the country …. see how that works? … your pals just ensured PRESIDENT Trump will be re-elected. Seek help for the next level of Trump DeRangeMent Syndrome … the bitter childish rants of your Mister Hyde personality having accomplished absolutely nothing positive since you went nuts 4 years ago on this forum.
Dear Watson,
Humanity and compassion. Humanity and compassion. Nothing trite. Humanity and compassion. Practicing exactly what Jesus thought and taught. Humanity and compassion.
Love all, feed all, serve all
ah, so … the moon is down so Mister Hyde is back in his coffin … now it’s the OTHER Mark McAffee speaking, is that it?
… your Markie-the-Everyman persona seems oblivious to the stomach-turning hypocrisy on display in your other posts.
Apparently the man, Donald Trump, doesn’t qualify for your brand of “compassion”… even as he has the weight of the world on his shoulders this hour. Go preach that insipid stuff to your pals – the AntiFa – and see how they take it. No mere co-incidence they’re Burning and looting and white Christian churches.
Since in the 4 years of your ranting, you’re adamant that people who support PRESIDENT Trump are guilty by association with him, then so are you responsible for what AntiFa is about … the intellectual children of your sire, the communist fellowtraveller. did he ever de-Stalin-ize?
The democrats are leading the way at advocating far left-wing policies/legislation that undermine personal liberty… This irrational fear of the so-called Covid 19 corona virus is an opportunity they do not intend to pass up in order to achieve that objective.
https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2020/06/02/hr-6666-covid-19-government-surveillance.aspx?cid_source=dnl&cid_medium=email&cid_content=art1HL&cid=20200602Z1&et_cid=DM554070&et_rid=885186139
Looks like Trump has incarcerated himself. He put up a big fence around the Whitehouse and can not go anywhere for fear of being booed. He is living in a prison he erected himself and jailed by the force of the sprite and will of the people.
A total liar that surrounds himself by other liars and facilitators. Bill Bar lying about police use of force.
It is wonderful to see our country taking this to the streets. Finally we the people are acting and change is in the air. The bad cops can no longer hide and the tax payers refuse to continue to support it. The Blue Line is done. New policies emerging that no longer tolerates abuse and silence from ranks.
If you see it…. you own it and must do something about it or be charged with a crime. Is a huge change and is a landmark.
Good police will keep their jobs if they speak up. Silence and inaction will no longer be tolerated.
On the other hand, maybe too many good cops won’t speak out or act their conscience because, they’re afraid to lose their jobs. It takes courage but I think we’re headed in the right direction. Listen to the people, and act on it! “The Blue Line is done” sounds like a good motto for these hard times, when you realize that maybe, just maybe, THEY are the bad guys at least occasionally, gotta end that.
Why am I not surprised… “Seven Democrats in favor and four Republicans in opposition”?
If one values their freedom then they would be wise to not vote Democrat…
“Colorado Lawmakers Advance Controversial Vaccine Bill”
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/FMfcgxwHNqBJzHvmbPqNFdRxKSwRMGjv
Perspectives on the Pandemic | The (Undercover) Epicenter Nurse | Episode Nine
https://youtu.be/UIDsKdeFOmQ
June 9, 2020
1hr 10min
86,650 views
This is always the case with us – there is absolutely no balance! Somewhere there is a lot of food, but somewhere it is sorely lacking.